The teams talks, which have been percolating for almost a month (Sporting News’ Sean Deveney broke the story early this month), will gain steam if pushed by Clippers star Chris Paul, who wields a lot of power in the organization despite his pending free agency this summer.

Clippers coach Vinny Del Negro is a proponent of the deal to get Garnett, Yahoo! Sports’ sources said.

Despite Garnett's pointed remarks at All-Star Weekend about remaining a Celtic, GM Danny Ainge reportedly hasn’t approached him to waive his no-trade clause and likely wouldn’t without an agreement in place. But there's strong belief—as SN noted early this week—he ultimately would consider it and, Yahoo! Sports reported, agree to it.

However, the Hawks, according to Yahoo!, also have discussed sending Pierce to another team, perhaps the Brooklyn Nets.

As Ainge downplayed the possibility the Celtics will be involved in a transaction before the deadline, GMs and personnel people around the league were saying quite the opposite, according to the Boston Herald. They’ll be stunned if the Celtics don’t make a deal of some sort.

“They’re too active,” one unidentified front-office type told the Herald. “They’ve been putting a lot of different things out there, and you’d have to think at least one of them is going to come through.”

Overall, Ainge told the Herald that his trade options are narrowing.

“It’s probably cooling down,” he said. “I’ve got answers from a lot of people that things aren’t going to happen, unless somebody springs something on you at the last minute. But that doesn’t happen a lot.”